Remember, remember!
The fifth of November,
The Gunpowder treason and plot;
I know of no reason
Why the Gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot!
(English folk verse)
Nov 5, 1605:
King James learns of
gunpowder plot
Early in the
morning, King James I of England learns that a plot to explode the Parliament
building has been foiled, hours before he was scheduled to sit with the rest of
the British government in a general parliamentary session.
At about
midnight on the night of November 4-5, Sir Thomas Knyvet, a justice of the
peace, found Guy Fawkes lurking in a cellar under the Parliament building and
ordered the premises searched. Some 20 barrels of gunpowder were found, and
Fawkes was taken into custody. During a torture session , Fawkes revealed that
he was a participant in an English Catholic conspiracy to annihilate England's
Protestant government and replace it with Catholic leadership.
What became known as the Gunpowder Plot was organized
by Robert Catesby, an English Catholic whose father had been persecuted by
Queen Elizabeth I for refusing to conform to the Church of England.
Guy Fawkes had converted to Catholicism, and his religious zeal led him to
fight in the Spanish army in the Netherlands. Catesby and the handful of other
plotters rented a cellar that extended under Parliament, and Fawkes planted the
gunpowder there, hiding the barrels under coal and wood.
As the November
5 meeting of Parliament approached, Catesby enlisted more English Catholics
into the conspiracy, and one of these, Francis Tresham, warned his Catholic
brother-in-law Lord Monteagle not to attend Parliament that day. Monteagle
alerted the government, and hours before the attack was to have taken place
Fawkes and the explosives were found. By torturing Fawkes, King James'
government learned of the identities of his co-conspirators. During the next
few weeks, English authorities killed or captured all the plotters and put the survivors
on trial, along with a few innocent English Catholics.
Guy Fawkes
himself was sentenced to be
hanged, drawn, and quartered in London. Moments before the start of his
gruesome execution, on January 31, 1606, he jumped from a ladder while climbing
to the hanging platform, breaking his neck and dying instantly.
Today, Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated across Great Britain every year on
November 5 in remembrance of the Gunpowder Plot. As dusk falls, villagers and
city dwellers across Britain light bonfires, set off fireworks, and burn
effigies of Guy Fawkes, celebrating his failure to blow Parliament and James I.From http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/
